Fleeing the Great Hunger

Ireland Park commemorates the movement of the Irish people on a massive scale during the mid-19th century. Fleeing their homeland due to the Great Famine (1845-1852), many Irish refugees began to travel in Canada. Canadian officials examined many of these emigrants at Grosse Île, an island in the St. Lawrence River 46 kilometres outside of Quebec City. Officials used the island to isolate people who arrived in Canada and showed signs of illness, particularly typhus. After the stop in Grosse Île, those who did not show symptoms of the disease made their way further into Canada to ports including Toronto. The Toronto Board of Health required all arrivals from Ireland to dock at Reese’s Wharf, not far from where Ireland Park is today. In 1847 alone, over 38,000 Irish people passed through the port of Toronto, at a time when the city’s population was only 20,000.

Designing Ireland Park

Ireland Park opened in 2007 at the southern end of Bathurst Quay, now known as Éireann Quay. Designed by Toronto architect and Irish immigrant Jonathan Kearns, the space was chosen due to its proximity to the former Reese’s Wharf, where many Irish immigrants would have first landed in Toronto. When Irish refugees stepped onto the Toronto waterfront, they did not receive a warm welcome. One observer noted how health officials treated those stepping off the ships “just like cattle.” Officials placed those who showed symptoms of typhus in fever sheds where the sick could be separated and receive care until either they perished or the disease ran its course. At first, officials had sheds set up on the wharf, but they were quickly overwhelmed. Eventually, the General Hospital at John and King Streets was used to treat these new arrivals.

One out of every six people who set out for Canada in 1847 did not live to see the following year. The names of 675 Irish immigrants who died in Toronto in 1847 can be found etched on the black Kilkenny limestone sculpture that can be found on the western side of the Park, shaped to evoke both the bow of a ship and the western shoreline of Ireland.

Canada Malting Silos

A massive concrete structure is impossible to miss as it stands imposingly between Little Norway Park and Ireland Park. Built by the Canadian Malting Company between 1929 and 1944, this facility was used for storing malt, an ingredient predominantly used for making beer or liquor. The location was ideal for the site’s operations, with a private wharf and direct access to both the Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways. This building serves as a reminder that industrial buildings and the railway gradually took over the waterfront. The development of rail offered convenience to companies like Canada Malting, which could ship and receive goods through direct access to land and water transportation. This building is one of the few reminders of the industrial growth along Toronto’s shoreline in the 1920s.

Dig Deeper…

For more information about Irish immigration to Toronto in the 19th century, see:

Mark McGowan. Death or Canada, The Irish famine and migration to Toronto, 1847. Toronto: Novalis Publishing, 2009.